


Toxic

by stardustandswimmingpools



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Cute, F/M, Female Friendship, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, I just love Bucky a lot, Marvel Gift Exchange, SO SORRY THIS IS LATE BUT HAPPY HOLIDAYS!, Tea, Toxic by Britney Spears, also nat, also not at alllllll holiday related, not my best work but full of love!, projection much, why do all my fics have tea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-27 10:35:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17160410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardustandswimmingpools/pseuds/stardustandswimmingpools
Summary: The women and Bucky have tea and gossip. Everything is okay.





	Toxic

**Author's Note:**

> SO SO SO SORRY ABOUT THE LATENESS! I can't apologize enough. This fic is a gift for @stolethekey on Tumblr for the Marvel Gift Exchange and I'm gonna blame my delayed submission on jet lag (I am currently in Israel and far from home! Wink wonk). But again SUPER sorry.  
> In ANY CASE.  
> Here's some absurd fluff, because I love these dumb kids and they deserve joy. Happy holidays @stolethekey and I hope you like this present! Cheers!

“Tea is done,” Pepper calls out to the general area of the living room, and Wanda and Natasha amble in, giggling. “You're giggling without me? Traitors.”

“We are giggling at you saying 'tea is done,’” Wanda says. “Like an old woman from last century.”

“I'll just put in a dash of salt,” Pepper says haughtily, turning her back on the women. Behind her, Natasha snickers.

“Don't be bitter, Pep. We love your elderly mannerisms.”

“Oh, please,” Pepper says. She turns back to them and smiles. “When your fiancé is a six-year old in the body of Tony Stark, sometimes you have to be an old woman. To compensate. Which one do you drink, Natasha?”

“Black, thanks,” Natasha says, sitting comfortably cross-legged on the island, though Pepper can’t recall her getting up there. Pepper looks around herself for the Earl Grey box, and spends a good minute frantically searching the counter before the box in question floats in front of her face, suspended by tendrils of red.

She takes it and turns to Wanda, embarrassed. “Thanks,” she says, and Wanda grins. “Sometimes I think I'd lose my head if it weren't attached to my shoulders.”

“Don't be so hard on yourself,” Wanda says. “You would keep running long after your head became detached.”

The three of them laugh, and the sound masks the footsteps approaching the doorway until Natasha is standing ramrod straight, pointing a knife into Bucky's face. Immediately Bucky’s hand is wrapped tight around Natasha’s wrist, knuckles white from the grip.

“Oh,” she says, pocketing the knife. “Reflex.”

“It's a good reflex,” Bucky concedes gruffly. “Better safe than sorry.” He glances around the kitchen at the trio of women holding mugs. “Did I interrupt…?”

Pepper opens her mouth, hoping that, as usual, her higher brain functions will jump in with a diplomatic and kind response as she says it, but Wanda interjects. “No. We were just going to have tea and girl talk.”

Which is, well, it’s true. But Pepper feels bad. Bucky’s face kind of scrunches for just a split second and he says, “Oh. I’ll just —”

“No,” says Pepper, before she can stop herself. “Why don’t you sit with us?”

Bucky eyes her. “I’m not a girl.”

Pepper purses her lips. “Well, no. But we like your company.”

“I only wanted to —”

“сидеть, James,” Natasha cajoles. “Don’t be stupid.”

Bucky glares at Natasha, and then softens. “Okay. If you want.”

“Want some tea?” Pepper offers, feeling quite a lot like an English queen. Bucky shrugs noncommittally. “We have herbal, black, oolong, chai...green...a _bunch_ of others...anything strike your fancy?”

“Herbal,” Bucky says slowly. “Please.”

Pepper pours the hot water onto a teabag of herbal tea, into a mug reading “World’s Best Boss.” “I don’t know why we have this,” she sighs, with a smile at the corner of her mouth.

“Is it yours, or Stark’s?” Wanda asks.

Pepper shrugs. “Tony is possessive about his mugs, so most of them are in our kitchen, but he’s also really irresponsible with his stuff, so it’s entirely likely this one just migrated down here. I don’t know.”

“Bet the kid got it for him,” says Natasha, smirking into her tea.

Pepper chuckles. “I wouldn’t be surprised.”

Wanda holds out her own ceramic mug and Pepper obligingly fills it with hot water. Then, fully armed with tea, they sidle back out to the living area.

* * *

 

Bucky snorts a laugh so violently his drink almost sloshes over. “I wish I could’ve seen that.”

“We’re never speaking of it again,” Natasha grumbles, and Wanda jabs her in the ribs. Natasha swats at her hand. “Nope. I’ll break your fingers.”

“Aww, you wouldn’t,” Wanda coos. Pepper laughs, setting her mug down on the coffee table so it doesn’t spill.

“Don’t test me, Maximoff,” threatens Natasha, raising her eyebrows, a hint of playfulness in her eyes.

Wanda retreats, hands up. “Okay, okay.” There’s a lull in the room, then she adds, “But if you don’t have pictures we will have no choice but to tie you up and make you do it again.”

“Videos!” Pepper coaxes. “C’mon, Tasha, it’s one and done. Just show us the evidence.”

“I don’t have any video, and I’m not doing it again,” Natasha says.  
“Liar,” Bucky says. “She has video. Barton would never see something like that and not take a video.”

“Pretty bold to think I wouldn’t delete it instantly,” Natasha counters.

“Nothing is deleted online,” Pepper says, wisely. “JARVIS, do you have a video?”

“JARVIS, if you betray me like this I won’t talk to you for a week,” Natasha says loudly.

Bucky takes a long sip of his tea. He says, “It’s worth it.”

“I won’t talk to _you_ for a week,” Natasha warns.

Bucky shrugs. “Worth it.”

Wanda snickers. She tries to link her arm with Natasha’s, but clearly Nat, though amused, is not going to give in so easily; she elbows Wanda off.

“While I am assured that presenting this recording would be of great amusement to the majority of the room, I am under strict command not to share any photograph or filmography of Ms. Romanoff without explicit permission,” says JARVIS pleasantly.

All eyes turn to Natasha, who has her arms folded over her chest, knees tucked up. She looks so unlike the Black Widow that it’s almost startling to find her here. Instead of the sleek, put-togetherness of the superhero, Natasha is just...Natasha. Natasha in sweatpants and a hoodie that in all likelihood belongs to Clint. Black Widow might kill anyone who saw this video, but Natasha wouldn’t.

So Pepper feels entirely comfortable saying, “Don’t be a spoilsport, Tasha.”

Wanda presses her lips together, poorly stifling a laugh. “Yes, Natasha, come on. Give JARVIS permission.”

Bucky only raises an eyebrow, and Natasha glares at all three of them in turn.

“After we see this, JARVIS, you delete them from your database _forever_ ,” she hisses, and then rolls her eyes. “Fine. Permission granted. Show the video, get it over with.”

The TV comes to life of JARVIS’s accord, and on it, a video begins to play with the intro of Britney Spears’ _Toxic_ from the video-JARVIS’s speakers. It’s Natasha, standing in front of a mirror in her room, holding a hairbrush and posing _shamelessly._ And then:

“Baby can’t you see,” video-Nat sings, and the room of people watching the video burst into incessant laughter. Bucky howls and slaps a hand on the couch cushion; Wanda snorts her tea up and it sloshes over the top when she shakily puts it back on the coffee table; Pepper’s cheeks hurt from laughing so hard. And video-Natasha does not stop. She owns the song, hits every single beat drop, and even does some frankly badass hair flips and headbangs.

Natasha — the real-life, present one — sits stony-faced for a minute as the video plays. But Pepper sees through tears of laughter the moment when her friend changes her mind. Slowly, a smile breaks over her face.

“Well, if you’re all going to watch me do this I think the least you can do is sing along,” she says.

“I don’t know this song,” Bucky says, shrugging apologetically.

“If you’re trying to convince that Britney Spears’ _Toxic_ wasn’t one of the first things you listened to when you came to, it won’t work,” Nat replies airily. “JARVIS, stop the video and play _Toxic_ from the top. You three. Up. Give me a show. Come on.”

Pepper sighs and gives Wanda a hand. They both hoist Bucky to his feet with a grunt, and JARVIS says, “Britney Spears’ _Toxic_.”

The strings in the song’s hook come over the sound system. The intro plays twice. Everyone in the room looks at each other simultaneously, and then, in the silence, a quarter of out-of-tune singers hiss:

“ _Baby, can’t you see_.”

Disco lights flood the room. Everyone laughs.

Everything is fine.

**Author's Note:**

> hhhhhhhhh i'm on tumblr @vivilevone come swing by and say hey! thanks!


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